Sleep requirements, including quality, depth, and length of sleep are extremely important to health and a normal active day.  Stress is the major detractor of sleep in its many forms.  Whether it is stress from play, work, relationships, or physical pain, a downward spiral begins when stress is not relieved.  Of course the best mental stress reduction is to pray continuously or to meditate throughout the day for brief periods.  But what about the physical stress of pain?  Is there something simple that I can take that is safe that will allow me better sleep?  An absolute yes! GELATIN!

In the industrialized world, our diet has changed so that we are consuming primarily muscle meat protein.  It turns out that approximately fifty percent of the protein in the body is contained in collagen or in the cooked form, gelatin.  There has been such a push on reduced fat for heart health that many people confuse fat with gelatin.  They separate it from the cooked meat instead of making protein rich gravy as it was done fifty years ago on the typical American table.  It was always one of my favorite things as a child to feast on the rich gravies that my mother made.  It did not make any difference what type of meat we had.  There was always gravy. White flour gravy with chicken was just the right touch to savor with conversation after Sunday diner.  Dark brown gravy that accompanied the roast beef with the evening meal on a work night was fantastic.  After the meal, sleep came on with splendid ease.  Red eye gravy that we mixed with the grits for breakfast seemed to always make the day go much easier.

You have a cold that just want go away and your mother wraps you up in nice warm blankets and prepares a hot bowl of chicken soup.  Ah, how relaxing a mother’s love and chicken soup that seem to make the cold evaporate as vapors leaving with the morning sun.  What did that chicken soup have that was never associated with health benefits?  It was of course the chicken stock collected from cooking down remains of the last meal prepared with chicken.  The stock of course was collected from the pot that cooked down skin, bones, and chicken carcass. This stock was rich in peptides, amino acids, and proteins or from shorter to longer, the building blocks necessary for health.  And let’s not overlook the fats that are a part of the rich drippings that are necessary for the formation of hormones in the body as well as many other functions.

Let’s not forget the multiple arrays of gelatin deserts and punch mixes.  Fruit gelatin was a great desert that was not filled with added sugar or artificial sweeteners.  One of my favorites was cherry gelatin made with fresh ripe red cherries in early June.  Ah, the punches were just unbelievable for special occasions.  Ginger ale mixed in equal parts with pineapple juice with a pack of lime Jello added is just unbelievably good – mmmmmahhhh!  There is much sugar in this punch, but it was only served on special occasions.

It is bedtime and you have had a terrible day.  Go find that pack of gelatin without sugar added and wet the powder out in a small amount of cold water.  After the powder is wetted and dispersed, you can then further dissolved it in hot water with a sleepy time tea or other hot drink like warm milk.  Just plain gelatin does not have much taste.  I know one person that just mixes a whole packet of gelatin or about a tablespoon full with water.  She then slugs it down just before bed and claims an extremely restful evening and much clearer thinking the next day.  It seems the right amount of gelatin for relaxation is about one teaspoon for each fifty pounds of body weight.  In the morning, you can sprinkle gelatin on your oatmeal or put it in your favorite smoothy.

Let’s not forget the ladies in the farm neighborhood where I grew up that took gelatin to relieve joint pain.  Yep, that’s right, just plain old gelatin.  Their claims were that it would make their joint pain just disappear in a matter of hours after consuming gelatin.  But then again, they also ate lots of dark leafy greens that seemed to be the other part of this formula for joint relief.

So you don’t believe me and you want to mess up my pleasant memories of childhood with messy science that most likely has been manipulated for profit?  Then you are on your own, but if you have that bent, it is some extremely interesting reading.  See further reading below.  From your laid back and relaxed, healed from back pain, and sleep apnea with great enjoyment of life from appropriate micronutrients and the love of God and others; feel your stress dissolve and your pain fly away as you go to sleep little baby – Pandemic Survivor

Gelatin from Wikipedia
Gelatin, Stress, and Longevity – Ray Peat
GABA and Glycine
Vanilloid receptor-1 (TRPV-1)-dependant activation of inhibitory neurotransmission in spinal gelatinosa neurons of mice –
TRPV1; on the road to pain relief 
The effects of glycine on subjective daytime performance in partially sleep restricted volunteers 
TRPV1 from Wikipedia